


Once Again, As In Olden Days

by faultsbylies



Category: The Young and the Restless
Genre: F/M, Fix-It, lord knows we need it with this writing, yuletide treats to warm the soul
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 23:39:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9095713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faultsbylies/pseuds/faultsbylies
Summary: He knows he fucked up enormously and he deserves to wallow in guilt and misery for a long, long time, but it’s Christmas, the season of perpetual hope. He’s wallowed enough for one day, and the woman he adores is sitting next to him, smiling at him, laughing with him, flirting with him a little bit, and he decides that maybe—just for today—it’s alright to be selfish.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A (belated) Christmas present for those of you that, like me, are wondering what the F this show is doing passing up an opportunity to bring these two complex, chemistry-filled characters together. Takes place on Christmas Eve when we find Billy at the Club by himself. Let's just pretend Phyllis is there as well. Just 'cause.

_Here we are, as in olden days_  
_Happy golden days of yore_  
_Faithful friends who are dear to us  
_ _Gather near to us once more_

 

Billy gives himself until Tuesday before his body is found floating down the river with the other garbage of this hellhole town. 

That’s the latest thought occupying his mind as he lifts his Glenlivet, knocks the last few gulps back with a swing of his head, and slams the empty glass onto the bar, slumped shoulders and a heavy sigh signalling defeat. Or maybe he’ll die through arson, skin and bones charred to a crisp as he takes the Chancellor Mansion down with him. 

No. Too macabre.

Besides, people would probably care more about the mansion.

He hums, waving the bartender over for his third refill of the night, his fingers tap-tap-tapping restlessly against the bar’s surface. He could walk out into the snow, lay down on the road and wait for some drunk to run him over? Surely there’s another hopeless idiot out there spending his Christmas drinking himself into a stupor. Then again, he’d been run over before—not exactly a foolproof procedure. But isn’t that what he does best? Catapult himself into a near-death condition and survive, only to endure endless complaints, looks of disapproval, mindless gossip, and self-righteous scoldings from Genoa City’s finest hypocrites, and it’s never really about him, is it? It’s always about all the different ways he’s hurting everyone. His kids, his mother, his company, his public image, his siblings. His siblings.

Another gulp. Another wince. Scotch burning comfortably in his chest; it’s the only comfort he has left.

Now where was he? Right. His siblings. Traci, Ashley, and good ol’ Saint Jack, who’s never done wrong in his entire life. And, listen, he gets it. He slept with his brother’s wife. Worse, even: he fell in love with his brother’s wife. He never expected his patriarchal betrayal to go unpunished. In a way, he knows he’s earned this, this relentless beatdown deserving of a self-sabotaging fuck-up like himself: terrible son, terrible brother, terrible brother- _in-law_ , terrible fiancée, terrible employee, terrib—

“Boo!” a voice whispers from behind him. Billy jumps, swivelling in his seat with a start. “All alone tonight?”

It’s like being punched in the gut, the wind getting knocked out of him just that fast. But the voice caresses his ear like a song, teasing, beguiling. During periods of psychological weakness, much like tonight, it would come to him in a daze of divine intervention. This time’s different, though. It’s accompanied by a scent that spins his head with its onslaught. And he knows that scent. And he’d recognize that voice anywhere.

When he turns around, however, the sight that greets him is… not what he expected to see.

“Oh,” he starts. “Wow.”

“Hey.”

“Hey. Phyllis. Hey.” He’s very aware he sounds like an idiot right now, wide eyes and mouth agape like a fish, and Phyllis has always been a vision—a knockout, really—but this is certainly different. What can he say? Evidently, not much. “I… wow."

Phyllis smirks, high-heeled and dolled-up, coat and purse dangling from one arm, graciously planting herself on the stool next to him. “It’s just hair, Billy.” 

She turns to set her belongings down and Billy takes a moment to admire her, the thump of his heart aching a little bit because, shit, it’s been so long since he’s even _seen_ her. And she’s blonde! And she’s as beautiful as ever. And she’s wrapped in a strapless red number that, quite frankly, agonizes him: hugging her form in a tortuously flattering manner, accentuating every curve of her body. 

She orders a drink and promptly faces him, and Billy has to rapidly raise his eyes from checking out her rear. He’s not as slick as he thinks he is, and she lets him know with a quirk of her brow. All he can do is grin and lick his lips; it’s not like she’s ever known him to be anything short of shameless.

“Billy, you know I care about you right?”

And that’s definitely not what he expected to hear. A “how are you?” maybe. Or “it’s been a while” even. But Phyllis never was the type to entertain any form of nonsense; straight to the point as always. “Do you?” he challenges, intrigue sobering him up at a rapid pace.

“I do. I really do. So don’t take this the wrong way, but…” she leans forward a bit, beckoning and bewitching, and Billy would very much like to kiss her right now, until: “…you reek.”

Cute. He feigns disgust as he lifts his nearly empty glass in the air. “You’re telling me this isn’t how you spend your Christmas Eve?”

“Drinking myself to the point of unconsciousness? Not my idea of a good time, honey.”

“Careful, now. You’re starting to sound like my mother.”

Now it’s her turn to look disgusted. She’s barely pulled back before he leans forward himself, a desperate attempt to maintain closeness. “How dare you.” 

He laughs, and it gives him such joy to see her smile in return. The lightness in the air is refreshing, devoid of the usual tension and awkwardness their last few encounters have typically been laden with. As if they were mere strangers. As if they never meant anything to each other. He missed this. “So. What brings you here on a night like tonight?”

“Actually, I was just on my way out ’til I saw you hanging around here by your lonesome. Thought I’d stop by and… say hello.” 

Billy waits for her to ask what _he’s_ doing here on a night like tonight, but the perpetual truth endures: the fact that he understands her—the entirety of her; good, bad and ugly—better than anyone else, it works both ways. He doesn’t have to ask to know what she’s thinking, can see for himself that she’s reading everything on his face: that he hoped he could spend the day at the Abbott household, reminiscing fond memories with his siblings, hoped that Jack could find it in his heart to forgive him—at the very least tolerate his presence—today, in the spirit of Christmas, only to have said hope squashed when his older brother exiled him from his home to celebrate Christmas here, at the bar, all alone.

“Well,” he says. “Hello.”

She chuckles. “Hello.”

“You look great.”

“Thank you. You look like shit.”

“Always a pleasure catching up with you, Phyllis Abbott.”

“Summers,” she corrects, glass kissing her lips as she takes a sip, a bright red stain left in its wake. “It’s Phyllis Summers now. Jack and I divorced. Remember?”

“Right. Right, you told me.” Scotch settles warmly on his tongue. He knows he should tread carefully here. It’s slightly embarrassing how happy he is to see her, to be in her company again, to be talking amicably and joking and smiling and all this on Christmas Eve. The last thing he wants to do is scare her off. “How are things going? With you and Jack?”

“Good. Very good, actually. Jack and I are at a really good place right now.”

A pause, and then: “Oh.”

Poker Face 101 for the ill-informed. Rule number one: Body language is everything. Each individual possesses a nervous habit (Billy’s is scratching), and nervous habits quickly unmask secrets the player intends to hide. A relaxed posture with a touch of confidence is ideal. Number two: Absolutely no smiling. Smiling is activated by muscles, and each muscle alerts a keen observer to the degree of a smile’s genuineness. (Phyllis is a keen observer. Conjointly: Billy is a smiler.) Number three: Talk evenly. When contributing to a conversation, ensure that the voice is at a consistently even tone. The slightest hitch in one’s voice could disclose the inner workings of the mind.

The predicament: not to overreact, but Billy feels like he’s been run over by a truck, his heart crushing, its shattered pieces sinking down to the bottom of his feet. However, for the sake of saving face, it is absolutely imperative that his demeanour does not betray his current state of emotional despair regarding the fact that his older brother and the woman who very well may have been the love of his life are “at a really good place right now”. _Absolutely_. _Imperative_.

Billy scratches his neck. “That’s… great,” he grimaces, his voice catching in between vowels.

Pathetic.

“Yeah,” Phyllis nods, and she looks so content, it’s difficult for him to maintain his bitterness for long. “This tug-of-war was only hurting us both, you know? So we've agreed that we each need to move on.” She raises her drink to her mouth. “That’s what I’m going to do.”

“Really?”

“I’m gonna pretend that tone of surprise doesn’t affect me. Yes, we’re both moving on. In fact, I’m planning on exiting Jabot very soon.”

“Now _that_  is surprising. You’re leaving Jabot? Really? Did you find work elsewhere?”

“Not necessarily. I’m working on an online strategy for Fenmore’s at the moment, but I’m hoping I can sweet talk Lauren into hiring me full-time. So to speak.”

“Wow! That’s great, Phyllis.”

“It is. It really is. And I’m not just asking for this as a favour from Lauren, by the way. I do think I’d be a great asset to her company and based on the talks we’ve shared about the project, I know she feels the same way. I think it would be very good for both of us.”

“I don’t doubt that for one second. I remember what it’s like working with you. She’d be very luck to have you on her team.” Phyllis is grinning. She looks _so happy_ , and, if he’s being honest with himself, he envies her for that: she’s moved on, not just from him but from the disaster that they’ve both played a hand in, and she’s made herself better through it; leaving Jabot, walking away from Jack with her head held high, paving a path for herself that  _serves_ herself, first and foremost. She's starting over. Blonde hair and all. Meanwhile, this is he: a complete and total wreck. But then she directs her smile at _him_  and he is sapped of all envy and torment in immediate succession.

Phyllis is  _happy_. He sees the way she carries herself: like the weight of the world isn’t resting on her shoulders, like she isn’t carrying a boulder of burden, isn’t plagued by guilt and stress and moral anguish, and he’s truly, genuinely, sincerely happy for her. He’d never wish for her to be subjected to the same form of torturous misery he has been enslaved to for the last few months. Not ever. And even though a part of him had always hoped that _he_ would be the one responsible for reviving this newfound exhilaration in her, he can’t begrudge her for seeking that happiness on her own, for locating it and claiming it for herself.

She was always better than him in that sense. He was never really worthy of her because of it.

“I’m proud of you, Phyllis.”

She beams, and he remembers what it felt like the first time he was accosted by this inconvenient reality: that he was completely and helplessly in love with her. “Thank you, Billy.”

They clink their glasses in toast, sharing a look over their drinks. Billy recalls a night not unlike tonight, full of similar promises and cautious enchantment:

_“Guess you didn’t figure yourself to be hooked up with such a soulless woman like me."_

And now, here they are, one torrid love affair, one broken engagement, one marriage up in flames, and endless heartbreaks later. He is without regret.

“What about you and Jack?” she asks, trying to sound casual and failing laudably. “Any, um. Any progress there?”

Bitter laughter from him, and then: “Not even a little bit.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault."

She retorts with bitter laughter of her own. “Actually, it kind of is.” Well. Fair enough. “Jack will come around eventually.”

“No, I’m pretty sure all Jack wants to do is… dig a hole in the ground and bury me in it.”

“Mm,” she nods, nursing her vodka stinger with a delicate grip. “Probably in the back garden next to the dining room so he can hear you screaming.”

“I wouldn’t put it past him.”

***

It astounds her how quickly time flies around him. They catch up on everything: Jack, Jabot, Brash and Sassy, Johnny and Katie, Summer, Jill—they spend at least half an hour on Jill alone. An accidental glance at the clock behind the bar informs her that she’s been here for well over an hour.

 _Shit_.

Billy follows her gaze, a sip of his drink—iced water, now, after her firm insistence—barely masking the motion. “Got somewhere to be?” he asks. “Don’t let me keep you.” 

“Nope,” she responds. “Nowhere else I need to be. I just lost track of time, that's all.”

“That tends to happen with us, I think.”

“It does.” She smiles. He returns it. The weight of their gaze is not lost on her; she blames her giddiness on the vodka. “But I _do_ need to use the Ladies’ Room. I’ll be right back. Excuse me.”

“Of course.”

She takes her purse with her. There’s a touch of a sway to her hips as she walks because she knows he’s watching. She blames that on the vodka too. 

When she steps into the hallway adjacent to the restroom, just out of his view, she pulls out her phone and dials Lauren’s number. Hi, Lauren. She’s _so_ sorry, but she can’t make it to the Christmas party tonight. No, no, everything’s fine. Something important has just come up and it needs her immediate attention. _Really_ sorry it’s so last minute. She _wishes_  she could be there. Would you tell Michael she wishes him a Merry Christmas, please? Thank you. Oh. Gloria? Oh… well, Merry Christmas to her, too. Thank you for understanding. Yes, she would _love_ to talk about that later. Yes, they _do_ have a lot to discuss. Alright. Merry Christmas. Bye-bye.

She’s grinning as she hangs up and her cheeks are in pain from all the smiling she’s been doing lately. She doesn’t care. She’s happy. She hasn’t been this happy in a long time.

And then she remembers Billy. Billy, whom she saw from her corner booth entering the Athletic Club with his head hanging down, making a beeline for the bar and filling himself with booze in the span of mere minutes. Billy, whom she’d watched from a distance, deliberating for a good half hour on whether she should just leave the Club—pretend she never saw him—or risk the awkwardness and walk up to him to say hello. Billy, who has been through hell this past year, just like she has, and deserves joy as well. This feeling she’s feeling, she wants that for him, too.

She tells herself it’s because she cares. Because before they were anything and everything to each other, they were friends. After all, she _is_ partly responsible for his current predicament. And even though she swore to move on from all things Abbott—both Jack _and_  Billy included—he was always there for her when she needed him most, without question and without fail; she owes it to him to be here for him in return, to support him, to accompany him, to be by his side as he tries to find his happiness again.

Moreover (not that she’d ever admit it to herself): she wants to be here. He makes her just as happy as she makes him.

And it’s Christmas, the season of everlasting hope. So why not? 

Billy greets her with a strange look on his face as she returns to the bar. “Everything okay?” he asks.

“Yeah,” she answers, with sincerity this time. “Everything’s okay.”

***

Somewhere in the middle of their conversation, Billy's stomach—devoid of everything but scotch and cookies and homemade fudge _—_ grumbles. Loudly. Either Phyllis doesn’t notice or she pretends not to, but he really ought to get something to eat, partly because he’s a firm believer of the fact that humans need to consume food in order to survive, but mostly because the grumbles are only going to get louder in time, and he’d like to avoid the humiliation in front of the woman he’s very much enraptured by. He worries, however, that she might take that as her cue to part ways; he’s not entirely sure she’s ready to be spotted dining with the man she had an affair with at the stroke of Christmas, and perhaps asking her to would just be selfish on his part.

Phyllis’ laugh grounds him back to reality, and he’s back to being hypnotized by her voice that he promptly brushes his hunger off.

“She's just so… alright. You know when you’re having a discussion with someone, and you just listen to them talk, and after a while you start wondering to yourself: ‘am I under any kind of narcotics? Did I take any drugs today?’ You know that kind of feeling?"

“I don’t think you understand, Phyllis. You’re talking about my _mother_ here. I am very familiar with that kind of feeling.”

“Yeah! That’s exactly what it’s like talking to Jill. I feel like I’m drained of all energy just listening to her speak."

“I swear, she thinks she’s talking to a different species. I just say ‘yes’ and agree with everything she says just to get her to stop talking.” 

The booze has rendered them giddy and slightly coquettish, and Billy has forgotten how it felt to laugh like this, to feel so at ease like this, and he’s sure—he’s _so sure_ —that she’s enjoying herself just as much as he is. So when his stomach grumbles for the fourth time that night—and he’s fairly certain Phyllis heard it this time—, he thinks to himself: why not? He’s entitled to this. He knows he fucked up enormously and he deserves to wallow in guilt and misery for a long, long time, but it’s Christmas, the season of everlasting hope. And he’s wallowed enough for one day, and the woman he adores is sitting next to him, smiling at him, laughing with him, flirting with him a little bit, and he decides that maybe it’s alright to be selfish. Despite the fact that she said she has nowhere to go, he knows Phyllis isn’t sporting a dress like _that_ just to hang around a bar on Christmas Eve. She probably has better things to do, a party to attend or something similar, but perhaps it’s not too outrageous of him to ask her to stay. Just for tonight.

“Hey,” he starts, the change in his tone evident. He tries not to let his nervousness show. “Have you eaten? You wanna grab a bite to eat or something? I’m starving.”

Phyllis takes a moment to think and Billy prepares himself. It won’t be so bad if she says no; this night felt like progress for them, and he already feels infinitely better than he did just hours ago. If there was ever potential for something more between them, it could always come at another time. And even if it didn’t, this easygoing companionship, this jovial friendship, it’s more than enough for him. Better than not having her in his life at all.

“Sure. I could eat,” she replies. Billy does an excellent job of playing it cool. “But I think the kitchen’s closed for the night. There aren’t a lot of places open at this hour.”

“Well, there’s always that burger joint two blocks down. I know for a fact that one’s open all night, even tonight.”

She responds with a pointed stare as her left brow arches sharply in delight. “Seriously? A burger joint? That’s where you want to take me?"

Billy bites his lower lip to keep from laughing too hard. “Why not? It’s not like we’re on a date, right?” he challenges, feeling a little bold. “We’re just two friends. Grabbing a bite to eat, hanging out. As friends do.”

“Riiiight,” she drawls, amusement painted all over her face.

The stars have aligned for him tonight, he thinks. For once, everything is working out the way he wants. What kind of poker player would he have been if he were never one to push his luck? “What do you say, beautiful?”

The smile she gives him could bring him to his knees. “Let’s go.”

***

Phyllis and Billy exit the Athletic Club side-by-side, shoulders pressed together and hands lightly touching: bold enough for the occasional caress, too hesitant to commit to anything more. For now. They can see their breaths as they near the door, the cold biting their smiles, teeth chattering amid their laughter. They're not too bothered. They're warmed by the embrace of their company. Absorbed in each other's proximity. Trapped in their own little world.

They pass two mistletoes on their way out, but neither Billy nor Phyllis care about anything outside of one another to notice.

 

 


End file.
